Tuesday, 15 April 2014

Article: The Case Of Power [DE] –Generation In Nigeria

By Jaye Gaskia

At the
inception of the fourth Republic, one key area prioritized by the then
victorious ruling party, the PDP, and its newly inaugurated presidency was
power. In 1999, when the current civilian democratic dispensation came into
being, the ruling PDP made fan fare of its intention to turn power generation,
distribution and transmission around as a way of ensuring that there was enough
electricity to power our triumphal march into the league of newly
industrializing economies.

15 years
down the line, what is the scorecard? Power generation as at 1999 had plummeted
to just about 2,000 MWs of available generated power, while the capacity of the
National Grid stood at barely 4,000 MWs.

A decade and
a half down the line, and with close to $50bn of public investment poured into
the sector, we are back to where we started from, with available power
generation for distribution once again hovering around the 2,000 MWs line.

In between
1999 and 2014, we have ‘managed’ to increase [what a fallacy?] power generation
to around 6,000 MWs, but with the proviso that the actual amount available for
distribution and transmission has never surpassed 4,500 MWs. In addition to
this, the capacity of the National Grid, through which available power is
transmitted, has remained stuck at just over 4,000 MWs, with the consequence
that every time available power generation for transmission exceeds 4,000 MWs,
the entire power infrastructure witnesses either significant partial system
failures or system collapses. It is on record that the last upgrade to the
power transmission infrastructure occurred more than three decades ago under
the military dictatorship of IBB!

So after
decades of lip service, and with tens of billions of dollars poured down the
drain; after the most intense pillaging of the treasury in our recent history,
we have been unable to meet the targets for power generation and transmission
set by successive regimes.

Now if this
situation is a direct reflection of the profligacy, treasury looting
propensity, and degree of light fingeredness of the faction of the thieving
ruling class organized in the PDP; then the complete absence of a sense of
recognition of the urgency of overcoming the challenge of power for the
Nigerian economy by the equally clueless opposition APC, underlines our
argument that this failure is a collective failure of the ruling class
regardless of the party they are organized in.

This
situation is worsened by the fact that neither the main opposition party, nor
any of the other mushroom parties of the ruling class have formulated or
presented any clear cut plan for tackling the energy question; yet the
overcoming of the energy challenge is so central to growing an inclusive
economy in a sustainable manner.

And now the
paradox: Our shameless thieving ruling class celebrates and flaunts the fact
that after the re-basing of the economy, the size of our GDP is now $510bn and
that it is now the largest economy in Africa, and the 26th largest
in the world, beating South Africa to the second position in Africa with a GDP
size of $370bn.

Yet the
South African economy with a size of $370bn still boasts the largest market
capitalization on the continent, with a market capitalization nearly doubles
that of Nigeria; and generates and transmits more than 41,000 MWs of
electricity. DRC, a country ravaged and impoverished by conflicts over control
of its vast mineral resources also plans to generate 40,000 MWs from a single
power generation project.

With one of
the highest gini-coefficients in the world, one of the widest gap between poor
and rich worldwide, it is perhaps not a coincidence that Africa’s richest man
is a Nigerian, who is also the world’s 25th richest person, at the
same time that his country’s GDP is also the 26th largest in the
world.

It is
certainly not a coincidence that Africa’s largest economy is also home to
Africa’s largest concentration of poor citizens, and is one of the poorest
countries in the world on account of citizen welfare.

What we are
witnessing is the unraveling of the edifice of self aggrandizement erected by
the ruling class to accommodate their greed. What is happening is the
manifestation of the historical failure of this congenitally corrupt and
inherently incompetent ruling class.

The lesson
we must draw from this is that the labour and sweat of our hard working but
impoverished people generate enough wealth to go around and meet every
citizens’ basic needs, but that the greed of our ruling class prevents this
from happening.

The task
that emerges from this lesson is that we must Take Back our country from the
death grip of this ruinous and gluttonous ruling class.